Kinematics is a branch of classical mechanics that describes the motion of points, bodies (objects), and systems of bodies (groups of objects) without considering the mass of each or the forces that caused the motion.[1][2][3] Kinematics, as a field of study, is often referred to as the "geometry of motion" and is occasionally seen as a branch of mathematics.[4][5][6] A kinematics problem begins by describing the geometry of the system and declaring the initial conditions of any known values of position, velocity and/or acceleration of points within the system. Then, using arguments from geometry, the position, velocity and acceleration of any unknown parts of the system can be determined. The study of how forces act on masses falls within kinetics, not kinematics. For further details, see analytical dynamics.

The term kinematic is the English version of A.M. Ampère's cinématique,[9] which he constructed from the Greekκίνημαkinema ("movement, motion"), itself derived from κινεῖνkinein ("to move").[10][11]

Kinematic and cinématique are related to the French word cinéma, but neither are directly derived from it. However, they do share a root word in common, as cinéma came from the shortened form of cinématographe, "motion picture projector and camera," once again from the Greek word for movement but also the Greek word for writing.[12]

Kinematics of a particle trajectory in a non-rotating frame of reference[edit]

Acceleration vector a, not parallel to the radial motion but offset by the angular and Coriolis accelerations, nor tangent to the path but offset by the centripetal and radial accelerations.

Kinematic vectors in plane polar coordinates. Notice the setup is not restricted to 2d space, but a plane in any higher dimension.

Particle kinematics is the study of the trajectory of a particle. The position of a particle is defined as the coordinate vector from the origin of a coordinate frame to the particle. For example, consider a tower 50 m south from your home, where the coordinate frame is located at your home, such that East is the x-direction and North is the y-direction, then the coordinate vector to the base of the tower is r = (0, −50, 0). If the tower is 50 m high, then the coordinate vector to the top of the tower is r = (0, −50, 50).

In the most general case, a three-dimensional coordinate system is used to define the position of a particle. However, if the particle is constrained to move in a surface, a two-dimensional coordinate system is sufficient. All observations in physics are incomplete without those observations being described with respect to a reference frame.

The position vector of a particle is a vector drawn from the origin of the reference frame to the particle. It expresses both the distance of the point from the origin and its direction from the origin. In three dimensions, the position of point P can be expressed as

where xP{\displaystyle x_{P}}, yP{\displaystyle y_{P}}, and zP{\displaystyle z_{P}} are the Cartesian coordinates and ı^{\displaystyle {\hat {\imath }}}, ȷ^{\displaystyle {\hat {\jmath }}} and k^{\displaystyle {\hat {k}}} are the unit vectors along the x{\displaystyle x}, y{\displaystyle y}, and z{\displaystyle z} coordinate axes, respectively. The magnitude of the position vector |P|{\displaystyle \left|\mathbf {P} \right|} gives the distance between the point P{\displaystyle \mathbf {P} } and the origin.

The direction cosines of the position vector provide a quantitative measure of direction.
It is important to note that the position vector of a particle isn't unique. The position vector of a given particle is different relative to different frames of reference.

The trajectory of a particle is a vector function of time, P(t){\displaystyle \mathbf {P} (t)}, which defines the curve traced by the moving particle, given by

The velocity of a particle is a vector quantity that describes the direction of motion and the magnitude of the motion of particle. More mathematically, the rate of change of the position vector of a point, with respect to time is the velocity of the point. Consider the ratio of the difference of two positions of a particle divided by the time interval, which is called the average velocity over that time interval. This average velocity is defined as
Velocity=displacement/time taken

Thus, velocity is the time rate of change of position of a point, and the dot denotes the derivative of those functions x, y, and z with respect to time. Furthermore, the velocity is tangent to the trajectory of the particle at every position the particle occupies along its path. Note that in a non-rotating frame of reference, the derivatives of the coordinate directions are not considered as their directions and magnitudes are constants.

The speed of an object is the magnitude |V| of its velocity. It is a scalar quantity:

where s is the arc-length measured along the trajectory of the particle. This arc-length traveled by a particle over time is a non-decreasing quantity. Hence, ds/dt is non-negative, which implies that speed is also non-negative.

The velocity vector can change in magnitude and in direction or both at once. Hence, the acceleration is the rate of change of the magnitude of the velocity vector plus the rate of change of direction of that vector. The same reasoning used with respect to the position of a particle to define velocity, can be applied to the velocity to define acceleration. The acceleration of a particle is the vector defined by the rate of change of the velocity vector. The average acceleration of a particle over a time interval is defined as the ratio.

Thus, acceleration is the first derivative of the velocity vector and the second derivative of the position vector of that particle. Note that in a non-rotating frame of reference, the derivatives of the coordinate directions are not considered as their directions and magnitudes are constants.

The magnitude of the acceleration of an object is the magnitude |A| of its acceleration vector. It is a scalar quantity:

A relative position vector is a vector that defines the position of one point relative to another. It is the difference in position of the two points.
The position of one point A relative to another point B is simply the difference between their positions

which is the difference between the components of their position vectors.

If point A has position components
PA=(XA,YA,ZA){\displaystyle \mathbf {P} _{A}=\left(X_{A},Y_{A},Z_{A}\right)}

If point B has position components
PB=(XB,YB,ZB){\displaystyle \mathbf {P} _{B}=\left(X_{B},Y_{B},Z_{B}\right)}

then the position of point A relative to point B is the difference between their components:
PA/B=PA−PB=(XA−XB,YA−YB,ZA−ZB){\displaystyle \mathbf {P} _{A/B}=\mathbf {P} _{A}-\mathbf {P} _{B}=\left(X_{A}-X_{B},Y_{A}-Y_{B},Z_{A}-Z_{B}\right)}

If point A has velocity components
VA=(VAx,VAy,VAz){\displaystyle \mathbf {V} _{A}=\left(V_{A_{x}},V_{A_{y}},V_{A_{z}}\right)}

and point B has velocity components
VB=(VBx,VBy,VBz){\displaystyle \mathbf {V} _{B}=\left(V_{B_{x}},V_{B_{y}},V_{B_{z}}\right)}

then the velocity of point A relative to point B is the difference between their components:
VA/B=VA−VB=(VAx−VBx,VAy−VBy,VAz−VBz){\displaystyle \mathbf {V} _{A/B}=\mathbf {V} _{A}-\mathbf {V} _{B}=\left(V_{A_{x}}-V_{B_{x}},V_{A_{y}}-V_{B_{y}},V_{A_{z}}-V_{B_{z}}\right)}

Alternatively, this same result could be obtained by computing the time derivative of the relative position vector RB/A.

In the case where the velocity is close to the speed of lightc (generally within 95%), another scheme of relative velocity called rapidity, that depends on the ratio of V to c, is used in special relativity.

which is the difference between the components of their accelerations.

If point C has acceleration components
AC=(ACx,ACy,ACz){\displaystyle \mathbf {A} _{C}=\left(A_{C_{x}},A_{C_{y}},A_{C_{z}}\right)}

and point B has acceleration components
AB=(ABx,ABy,ABz){\displaystyle \mathbf {A} _{B}=\left(A_{B_{x}},A_{B_{y}},A_{B_{z}}\right)}

then the acceleration of point C relative to point B is the difference between their components:
AC/B=AC−AB=(ACx−ABx,ACy−ABy,ACz−ABz){\displaystyle \mathbf {A} _{C/B}=\mathbf {A} _{C}-\mathbf {A} _{B}=\left(A_{C_{x}}-A_{B_{x}},A_{C_{y}}-A_{B_{y}},A_{C_{z}}-A_{B_{z}}\right)}

Alternatively, this same result could be obtained by computing the second time derivative of the relative position vector PB/A.

For the case of constant acceleration, the differential equation Eq 1) can be integrated as the acceleration vector A of a point P is constant in magnitude and direction. Such a point is said to undergo uniformly accelerated motion[citation needed]. In this case, the velocity V(t) and then the trajectory P(t) of the particle can be obtained by integrating the acceleration equation A with respect to time.[13]

Assuming that the initial conditions of the position, P0{\displaystyle \mathbf {P} _{0}}, and velocity V0{\displaystyle \mathbf {V} _{0}} at time t=0{\displaystyle t=0} are known, the first integration yields the velocity of the particle as a function of time.

This can be simplified using the notation for the magnitudes of the vectors ||A||=a,||V||=v,||P−P0||=Δx{\displaystyle ||\mathbf {A} ||=a,||\mathbf {V} ||=v,||\mathbf {P} -\mathbf {P} _{0}||=\Delta x}[citation needed] where Δx{\displaystyle \Delta x} can be any curvaceous path taken as the constant tangential acceleration is applied along that path[citation needed], so

v2=v02+2a⋅Δx.{\displaystyle v^{2}=v_{0}^{2}+2a\cdot \Delta x.}

This reduces the parametric equations of motion of the particle to a cartesian relationship of speed versus position. This relation is useful when time is unknown. We also know that Δx=∫(v)dt{\displaystyle \Delta x=\int (v)dt} or Δx{\displaystyle \Delta x} is the area under a v, t graph [14]

Velocity Time physics graph

. We can take Δx{\displaystyle \Delta x} by adding the top area and the bottom area. The bottom area is a rectangle, and the area of a rectangle is the A⋅B{\displaystyle A\cdot B} where A{\displaystyle A} is the width and B{\displaystyle B} is the height.[15] In this case A=t{\displaystyle A=t} and B=v0{\displaystyle B=v_{0}} (note that the A{\displaystyle A} here is different from the acceleration a{\displaystyle a}). This means that the bottom area is tv0{\displaystyle tv_{0}}. Now let's find the top area (a triangle). The area of a trangle is 12BH{\displaystyle {\frac {1}{2}}BH} where B{\displaystyle B} is the base and H{\displaystyle H} is the height.[16] In this case, B=t{\displaystyle B=t} & H=at{\displaystyle H=at} or A=12BH=12att=12at2=at22{\displaystyle A={\frac {1}{2}}BH={\frac {1}{2}}att={\frac {1}{2}}at^{2}={\frac {at^{2}}{2}}}. Adding tv0{\displaystyle tv_{0}} and at22{\displaystyle {\frac {at^{2}}{2}}} results in the equation Δx{\displaystyle \Delta x} results in the equation Δx=tv0+at22{\displaystyle \Delta x=tv_{0}+{\frac {at^{2}}{2}}}.[17] This equation is very useful when the final velocity v{\displaystyle v} is unknown.

Figure 2: Velocity and acceleration for nonuniform circular motion: the velocity vector is tangential to the orbit, but the acceleration vector is not radially inward because of its tangential component aθ that increases the rate of rotation: dω/dt = |aθ|/R.

It is often convenient to formulate the trajectory of a particle P(t) = (X(t), Y(t) and Z(t)) using polar coordinates in the X–Y plane. In this case, its velocity and acceleration take a convenient form.

Recall that the trajectory of a particle P is defined by its coordinate vector P measured in a fixed reference frame F. As the particle moves, its coordinate vector P(t) traces its trajectory, which is a curve in space, given by:

where i, j, and k are the unit vectors along the X, Y and Z axes of the reference frameF, respectively.

Consider a particle P that moves only on the surface of a circular cylinder R(t)=constant, it is possible to align the Z axis of the fixed frame F with the axis of the cylinder. Then, the angle θ around this axis in the X–Y plane can be used to define the trajectory as,

Where R, theta, and Z might be continuously differentiable functions of time and the function notation is dropped for simplicity. The velocity vector VP is the time derivative of the trajectory P(t), which yields:

The term −Rθ˙2er{\displaystyle -R{\dot {\theta }}^{2}{\textbf {e}}_{r}} acts toward the center of curvature of the path at that point on the path, is commonly called the centripetal acceleration. The term 2R˙θ˙eθ{\displaystyle 2{\dot {R}}{\dot {\theta }}{\textbf {e}}_{\theta }} is called the Coriolis acceleration.

If the trajectory of the particle is constrained to lie on a cylinder, then the radius R is constant and the velocity and acceleration vectors simplify. The velocity of VP is the time derivative of the trajectory P(t),

The movement of components of a mechanical system are analyzed by attaching a reference frame to each part and determining how the various reference frames move relative to each other. If the structural stiffness of the parts are sufficient, then their deformation can be neglected and rigid transformations can be used to define this relative movement. This reduces the description of the motion of the various parts of a complicated mechanical system to a problem of describing the geometry of each part and geometric association of each part relative to other parts.

Geometry is the study of the properties of figures that remain the same while the space is transformed in various ways—more technically, it is the study of invariants under a set of transformations.[19] These transformations can cause the displacement of the triangle in the plane, while leaving the vertex angle and the distances between vertices unchanged. Kinematics is often described as applied geometry, where the movement of a mechanical system is described using the rigid transformations of Euclidean geometry.

The coordinates of points in a plane are two-dimensional vectors in R2 (two dimensional space). Rigid transformations are those that preserve the distance between any two points. The set of rigid transformations in an n-dimensional space is called the special Euclidean group on Rn, and denoted SE(n).

The movement of each of the components of the Boulton & Watt Steam Engine (1784) is modeled by a continuous set of rigid displacements.

The position of one component of a mechanical system relative to another is defined by introducing a reference frame, say M, on one that moves relative to a fixed frame, F, on the other. The rigid transformation, or displacement, of M relative to F defines the relative position of the two components. A displacement consists of the combination of a rotation and a translation.

The set of all displacements of M relative to F is called the configuration space of M. A smooth curve from one position to another in this configuration space is a continuous set of displacements, called the motion of M relative to F. The motion of a body consists of a continuous set of rotations and translations.

The combination of a rotation and translation in the plane R2 can be represented by a certain type of 3x3 matrix known as a homogeneous transform. The 3x3 homogeneous transform is constructed from a 2x2 rotation matrix A(φ) and the 2x1 translation vector d=(dx, dy), as:

These homogeneous transforms perform rigid transformations on the points in the plane z=1, that is on points with coordinates p=(x, y, 1).

In particular, let p define the coordinates of points in a reference frame M coincident with a fixed frame F. Then, when the origin of M is displaced by the translation vector d relative to the origin of F and rotated by the angle φ relative to the x-axis of F, the new coordinates in F of points in M are given by:

If a rigid body moves so that its reference frameM does not rotate (∅=0) relative to the fixed frame F, the motion is called pure translation. In this case, the trajectory of every point in the body is an offset of the trajectory d(t) of the origin of M, that is:

where the dot denotes the derivative with respect to time and VO and AO are the velocity and acceleration, respectively, of the origin of the moving frame M. Recall the coordinate vector p in M is constant, so its derivative is zero.

Figure 1: The angular velocity vector Ω points up for counterclockwise rotation and down for clockwise rotation, as specified by the right-hand rule. Angular position θ(t) changes with time at a rate ω(t) = dθ/dt.

Rotational or angular kinematics is the description of the rotation of an object.[21] The description of rotation requires some method for describing orientation. Common descriptions include Euler angles and the kinematics of turns induced by algebraic products.

In what follows, attention is restricted to simple rotation about an axis of fixed orientation. The z-axis has been chosen for convenience.

Position

This allows the description of a rotation as the angular position of a planar reference frame M relative to a fixed F about this shared z-axis. Coordinates p = (x, y) in M are related to coordinates P = (X, Y) in F by the matrix equation:

Angular position : the oriented distance from a selected origin on the rotational axis to a point of an object is a vector r ( t ) locating the point. The vector r(t) has some projection (or, equivalently, some component) r⊥(t) on a plane perpendicular to the axis of rotation. Then the angular position of that point is the angle θ from a reference axis (typically the positive x-axis) to the vector r⊥(t) in a known rotation sense (typically given by the right-hand rule).

Angular velocity : the angular velocity ω is the rate at which the angular position θ changes with respect to time t:

ω=dθdt{\displaystyle \omega ={\frac {d\theta }{dt}}}

The angular velocity is represented in Figure 1 by a vector Ω pointing along the axis of rotation with magnitude ω and sense determined by the direction of rotation as given by the right-hand rule.

Angular acceleration : the magnitude of the angular acceleration α is the rate at which the angular velocity ω changes with respect to time t:

α=dωdt{\displaystyle \alpha ={\frac {d\omega }{dt}}}

The equations of translational kinematics can easily be extended to planar rotational kinematics for constant angular acceleration with simple variable exchanges:

Here θi and θf are, respectively, the initial and final angular positions, ωi and ωf are, respectively, the initial and final angular velocities, and α is the constant angular acceleration. Although position in space and velocity in space are both true vectors (in terms of their properties under rotation), as is angular velocity, angle itself is not a true vector.

Important formulas in kinematics define the velocity and acceleration of points in a moving body as they trace trajectories in three-dimensional space. This is particularly important for the center of mass of a body, which is used to derive equations of motion using either Newton's second law or Lagrange's equations.

In order to define these formulas, the movement of a component B of a mechanical system is defined by the set of rotations [A(t)] and translations d(t) assembled into the homogeneous transformation [T(t)]=[A(t), d(t)]. If p is the coordinates of a point P in B measured in the moving reference frameM, then the trajectory of this point traced in F is given by:

Kinematic constraints are constraints on the movement of components of a mechanical system. Kinematic constraints can be considered to have two basic forms, (i) constraints that arise from hinges, sliders and cam joints that define the construction of the system, called holonomic constraints, and (ii) constraints imposed on the velocity of the system such as the knife-edge constraint of ice-skates on a flat plane, or rolling without slipping of a disc or sphere in contact with a plane, which are called non-holonomic constraints. The following are some common examples.

An object that rolls against a surface without slipping obeys the condition that the velocity of its center of mass is equal to the cross product of its angular velocity with a vector from the point of contact to the center of mass:

This is the case where bodies are connected by an idealized cord that remains in tension and cannot change length. The constraint is that the sum of lengths of all segments of the cord is the total length, and accordingly the time derivative of this sum is zero.[22][23][24] A dynamic problem of this type is the pendulum. Another example is a drum turned by the pull of gravity upon a falling weight attached to the rim by the inextensible cord.[25] An equilibrium problem (i.e. not kinematic) of this type is the catenary.[26]

Reuleaux called the ideal connections between components that form a machine kinematic pairs. He distinguished between higher pairs which were said to have line contact between the two links and lower pairs that have area contact between the links. J. Phillips shows that there are many ways to construct pairs that do not fit this simple classification.[27]

A lower pair is an ideal joint, or holonomic constraint, that maintains contact between a point, line or plane in a moving solid (three-dimensional) body to a corresponding point line or plane in the fixed solid body. There are the following cases:

A revolute pair, or hinged joint, requires a line, or axis, in the moving body to remain co-linear with a line in the fixed body, and a plane perpendicular to this line in the moving body maintain contact with a similar perpendicular plane in the fixed body. This imposes five constraints on the relative movement of the links, which therefore has one degree of freedom, which is pure rotation about the axis of the hinge.

A prismatic joint, or slider, requires that a line, or axis, in the moving body remain co-linear with a line in the fixed body, and a plane parallel to this line in the moving body maintain contact with a similar parallel plane in the fixed body. This imposes five constraints on the relative movement of the links, which therefore has one degree of freedom. This degree of freedom is the distance of the slide along the line.

A cylindrical joint requires that a line, or axis, in the moving body remain co-linear with a line in the fixed body. It is a combination of a revolute joint and a sliding joint. This joint has two degrees of freedom. The position of the moving body is defined by both the rotation about and slide along the axis.

A spherical joint, or ball joint, requires that a point in the moving body maintain contact with a point in the fixed body. This joint has three degrees of freedom.

A planar joint requires that a plane in the moving body maintain contact with a plane in fixed body. This joint has three degrees of freedom.

Generally speaking, a higher pair is a constraint that requires a curve or surface in the moving body to maintain contact with a curve or surface in the fixed body. For example, the contact between a cam and its follower is a higher pair called a cam joint. Similarly, the contact between the involute curves that form the meshing teeth of two gears are cam joints.

Rigid bodies ("links") connected by kinematic pairs ("joints") are known as kinematic chains.Mechanisms and robots are examples of kinematic chains. The degree of freedom of a kinematic chain is computed from the number of links and the number and type of joints using the mobility formula. This formula can also be used to enumerate the topologies of kinematic chains that have a given degree of freedom, which is known as type synthesis in machine design.

N=6, j=7 : a six-bar linkage. This must have two links ("ternary links") that support three joints. There are two distinct topologies that depend on how the two ternary linkages are connected. In the Watt topology, the two ternary links have a common joint; in the Stephenson topology, the two ternary links do not have a common joint and are connected by binary links.[28]

1.
Classical mechanics
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In physics, classical mechanics is one of the two major sub-fields of mechanics, along with quantum mechanics. Classical mechanics is concerned with the set of physical laws describing the motion of bodies under the influence of a system of forces. The study of the motion of bodies is an ancient one, making classical mechanics one of the oldest and largest subjects in science, engineering and technology. Classical mechanics describes the motion of objects, from projectiles to parts of machinery, as well as astronomical objects, such as spacecraft, planets, stars. Within classical mechanics are fields of study that describe the behavior of solids, liquids and gases, Classical mechanics also provides extremely accurate results as long as the domain of study is restricted to large objects and the speeds involved do not approach the speed of light. When both quantum and classical mechanics cannot apply, such as at the level with high speeds. Since these aspects of physics were developed long before the emergence of quantum physics and relativity, however, a number of modern sources do include relativistic mechanics, which in their view represents classical mechanics in its most developed and accurate form. Later, more abstract and general methods were developed, leading to reformulations of classical mechanics known as Lagrangian mechanics and these advances were largely made in the 18th and 19th centuries, and they extend substantially beyond Newtons work, particularly through their use of analytical mechanics. The following introduces the concepts of classical mechanics. For simplicity, it often models real-world objects as point particles, the motion of a point particle is characterized by a small number of parameters, its position, mass, and the forces applied to it. Each of these parameters is discussed in turn, in reality, the kind of objects that classical mechanics can describe always have a non-zero size. Objects with non-zero size have more complicated behavior than hypothetical point particles, because of the degrees of freedom. However, the results for point particles can be used to such objects by treating them as composite objects. The center of mass of a composite object behaves like a point particle, Classical mechanics uses common-sense notions of how matter and forces exist and interact. It assumes that matter and energy have definite, knowable attributes such as where an object is in space, non-relativistic mechanics also assumes that forces act instantaneously. The position of a point particle is defined with respect to a fixed reference point in space called the origin O, in space. A simple coordinate system might describe the position of a point P by means of a designated as r. In general, the point particle need not be stationary relative to O, such that r is a function of t, the time

2.
Newton's laws of motion
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Newtons laws of motion are three physical laws that, together, laid the foundation for classical mechanics. They describe the relationship between a body and the forces acting upon it, and its motion in response to those forces. More precisely, the first law defines the force qualitatively, the second law offers a measure of the force. These three laws have been expressed in different ways, over nearly three centuries, and can be summarised as follows. The three laws of motion were first compiled by Isaac Newton in his Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, Newton used them to explain and investigate the motion of many physical objects and systems. For example, in the volume of the text, Newton showed that these laws of motion, combined with his law of universal gravitation. Newtons laws are applied to objects which are idealised as single point masses, in the sense that the size and this can be done when the object is small compared to the distances involved in its analysis, or the deformation and rotation of the body are of no importance. In this way, even a planet can be idealised as a particle for analysis of its orbital motion around a star, in their original form, Newtons laws of motion are not adequate to characterise the motion of rigid bodies and deformable bodies. Leonhard Euler in 1750 introduced a generalisation of Newtons laws of motion for rigid bodies called Eulers laws of motion, if a body is represented as an assemblage of discrete particles, each governed by Newtons laws of motion, then Eulers laws can be derived from Newtons laws. Eulers laws can, however, be taken as axioms describing the laws of motion for extended bodies, Newtons laws hold only with respect to a certain set of frames of reference called Newtonian or inertial reference frames. Other authors do treat the first law as a corollary of the second, the explicit concept of an inertial frame of reference was not developed until long after Newtons death. In the given mass, acceleration, momentum, and force are assumed to be externally defined quantities. This is the most common, but not the interpretation of the way one can consider the laws to be a definition of these quantities. Newtonian mechanics has been superseded by special relativity, but it is useful as an approximation when the speeds involved are much slower than the speed of light. The first law states that if the net force is zero, the first law can be stated mathematically when the mass is a non-zero constant, as, ∑ F =0 ⇔ d v d t =0. Consequently, An object that is at rest will stay at rest unless a force acts upon it, an object that is in motion will not change its velocity unless a force acts upon it. This is known as uniform motion, an object continues to do whatever it happens to be doing unless a force is exerted upon it. If it is at rest, it continues in a state of rest, if an object is moving, it continues to move without turning or changing its speed

3.
Continuum mechanics
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Continuum mechanics is a branch of mechanics that deals with the analysis of the kinematics and the mechanical behavior of materials modeled as a continuous mass rather than as discrete particles. The French mathematician Augustin-Louis Cauchy was the first to formulate such models in the 19th century, research in the area continues till today. Modeling an object as a continuum assumes that the substance of the object completely fills the space it occupies, Continuum mechanics deals with physical properties of solids and fluids which are independent of any particular coordinate system in which they are observed. These physical properties are represented by tensors, which are mathematical objects that have the required property of being independent of coordinate system. These tensors can be expressed in coordinate systems for computational convenience, Materials, such as solids, liquids and gases, are composed of molecules separated by space. On a microscopic scale, materials have cracks and discontinuities, a continuum is a body that can be continually sub-divided into infinitesimal elements with properties being those of the bulk material. More specifically, the continuum hypothesis/assumption hinges on the concepts of an elementary volume. This condition provides a link between an experimentalists and a viewpoint on constitutive equations as well as a way of spatial and statistical averaging of the microstructure. The latter then provide a basis for stochastic finite elements. The levels of SVE and RVE link continuum mechanics to statistical mechanics, the RVE may be assessed only in a limited way via experimental testing, when the constitutive response becomes spatially homogeneous. Specifically for fluids, the Knudsen number is used to assess to what extent the approximation of continuity can be made, consider car traffic on a highway---with just one lane for simplicity. Somewhat surprisingly, and in a tribute to its effectiveness, continuum mechanics effectively models the movement of cars via a differential equation for the density of cars. The familiarity of this situation empowers us to understand a little of the continuum-discrete dichotomy underlying continuum modelling in general. To start modelling define that, x measure distance along the highway, t is time, ρ is the density of cars on the highway, cars do not appear and disappear. Consider any group of cars, from the car at the back of the group located at x = a to the particular car at the front located at x = b. The total number of cars in this group N = ∫ a b ρ d x, since cars are conserved d N / d t =0. The only way an integral can be zero for all intervals is if the integrand is zero for all x, consequently, conservation derives the first order nonlinear conservation PDE ∂ ρ ∂ t + ∂ ∂ x =0 for all positions on the highway. This conservation PDE applies not only to car traffic but also to fluids, solids, crowds, animals, plants, bushfires, financial traders and this PDE is one equation with two unknowns, so another equation is needed to form a well posed problem

4.
Statics
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When in static equilibrium, the acceleration of the system is zero and the system is either at rest, or its center of mass moves at constant velocity. The application of Newtons second law to a system gives, F = m a, where bold font indicates a vector that has magnitude and direction. F is the total of the acting on the system, m is the mass of the system. The summation of forces will give the direction and the magnitude of the acceleration will be proportional to the mass. The assumption of static equilibrium of a =0 leads to, the summation of forces, one of which might be unknown, allows that unknown to be found. Likewise the application of the assumption of zero acceleration to the summation of moments acting on the leads to. The summation of moments, one of which might be unknown and these two equations together, can be applied to solve for as many as two loads acting on the system. From Newtons first law, this implies that the net force, the net forces equaling zero is known as the first condition for equilibrium, and the net torque equaling zero is known as the second condition for equilibrium. A scalar is a quantity which only has a magnitude, such as mass or temperature, a vector has a magnitude and a direction. There are several notations to identify a vector, including, A bold faced character V An underlined character V A character with an arrow over it V →, vectors are added using the parallelogram law or the triangle law. Vectors contain components in orthogonal bases, unit vectors i, j, and k are, by convention, along the x, y, and z axes, respectively. Force is the action of one body on another, a force is either a push or a pull. A force tends to move a body in the direction of its action, the action of a force is characterized by its magnitude, by the direction of its action, and by its point of application. Thus, force is a quantity, because its effect depends on the direction as well as on the magnitude of the action. Forces are classified as either contact or body forces, a contact force is produced by direct physical contact, an example is the force exerted on a body by a supporting surface. A body force is generated by virtue of the position of a body within a field such as a gravitational, electric. An example of a force is the weight of a body in the Earths gravitational field. In addition to the tendency to move a body in the direction of its application, the axis may be any line which neither intersects nor is parallel to the line of action of the force

5.
Acceleration
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Acceleration, in physics, is the rate of change of velocity of an object with respect to time. An objects acceleration is the net result of any and all forces acting on the object, the SI unit for acceleration is metre per second squared. Accelerations are vector quantities and add according to the parallelogram law, as a vector, the calculated net force is equal to the product of the objects mass and its acceleration. For example, when a car starts from a standstill and travels in a line at increasing speeds. If the car turns, there is an acceleration toward the new direction, in this example, we can call the forward acceleration of the car a linear acceleration, which passengers in the car might experience as a force pushing them back into their seats. When changing direction, we call this non-linear acceleration, which passengers might experience as a sideways force. If the speed of the car decreases, this is an acceleration in the direction from the direction of the vehicle. Passengers may experience deceleration as a force lifting them forwards, mathematically, there is no separate formula for deceleration, both are changes in velocity. Each of these accelerations might be felt by passengers until their velocity matches that of the car, an objects average acceleration over a period of time is its change in velocity divided by the duration of the period. Mathematically, a ¯ = Δ v Δ t, instantaneous acceleration, meanwhile, is the limit of the average acceleration over an infinitesimal interval of time. The SI unit of acceleration is the metre per second squared, or metre per second per second, as the velocity in metres per second changes by the acceleration value, every second. An object moving in a circular motion—such as a satellite orbiting the Earth—is accelerating due to the change of direction of motion, in this case it is said to be undergoing centripetal acceleration. Proper acceleration, the acceleration of a relative to a free-fall condition, is measured by an instrument called an accelerometer. As speeds approach the speed of light, relativistic effects become increasingly large and these components are called the tangential acceleration and the normal or radial acceleration. Geometrical analysis of space curves, which explains tangent, normal and binormal, is described by the Frenet–Serret formulas. Uniform or constant acceleration is a type of motion in which the velocity of an object changes by an amount in every equal time period. A frequently cited example of uniform acceleration is that of an object in free fall in a gravitational field. The acceleration of a body in the absence of resistances to motion is dependent only on the gravitational field strength g

6.
Angular momentum
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In physics, angular momentum is the rotational analog of linear momentum. It is an important quantity in physics because it is a conserved quantity – the angular momentum of a system remains constant unless acted on by an external torque. The definition of momentum for a point particle is a pseudovector r×p. This definition can be applied to each point in continua like solids or fluids, unlike momentum, angular momentum does depend on where the origin is chosen, since the particles position is measured from it. The angular momentum of an object can also be connected to the angular velocity ω of the object via the moment of inertia I. However, while ω always points in the direction of the rotation axis, Angular momentum is additive, the total angular momentum of a system is the vector sum of the angular momenta. For continua or fields one uses integration, torque can be defined as the rate of change of angular momentum, analogous to force. Applications include the gyrocompass, control moment gyroscope, inertial systems, reaction wheels, flying discs or Frisbees. In general, conservation does limit the motion of a system. In quantum mechanics, angular momentum is an operator with quantized eigenvalues, Angular momentum is subject to the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, meaning only one component can be measured with definite precision, the other two cannot. Also, the spin of elementary particles does not correspond to literal spinning motion, Angular momentum is a vector quantity that represents the product of a bodys rotational inertia and rotational velocity about a particular axis. Angular momentum can be considered an analog of linear momentum. Thus, where momentum is proportional to mass m and linear speed v, p = m v, angular momentum is proportional to moment of inertia I. Unlike mass, which only on amount of matter, moment of inertia is also dependent on the position of the axis of rotation. Unlike linear speed, which occurs in a line, angular speed occurs about a center of rotation. Therefore, strictly speaking, L should be referred to as the angular momentum relative to that center and this simple analysis can also apply to non-circular motion if only the component of the motion which is perpendicular to the radius vector is considered. In that case, L = r m v ⊥, where v ⊥ = v sin ⁡ θ is the component of the motion. It is this definition, × to which the moment of momentum refers

7.
Couple (mechanics)
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In mechanics, a couple is a system of forces with a resultant moment but no resultant force. A better term is force couple or pure moment and its effect is to create rotation without translation, or more generally without any acceleration of the centre of mass. In rigid body mechanics, force couples are free vectors, meaning their effects on a body are independent of the point of application, the resultant moment of a couple is called a torque. This is not to be confused with the term torque as it is used in physics, instead, torque is a special case of moment. Torque has special properties that moment does not have, in particular the property of being independent of reference point, definition A couple is a pair of forces, equal in magnitude, oppositely directed, and displaced by perpendicular distance or moment. The simplest kind of couple consists of two equal and opposite forces whose lines of action do not coincide and this is called a simple couple. The forces have an effect or moment called a torque about an axis which is normal to the plane of the forces. The SI unit for the torque of the couple is newton metre. When d is taken as a vector between the points of action of the forces, then the couple is the product of d and F, i. e. τ = | d × F |. The moment of a force is defined with respect to a certain point P, and in general when P is changed. However, the moment of a couple is independent of the reference point P, in other words, a torque vector, unlike any other moment vector, is a free vector. The proof of claim is as follows, Suppose there are a set of force vectors F1, F2, etc. that form a couple, with position vectors r1, r2. The moment about P is M = r 1 × F1 + r 2 × F2 + ⋯ Now we pick a new reference point P that differs from P by the vector r. The new moment is M ′ = × F1 + × F2 + ⋯ Now the distributive property of the cross product implies M ′ = + r ×, however, the definition of a force couple means that F1 + F2 + ⋯ =0. Therefore, M ′ = r 1 × F1 + r 2 × F2 + ⋯ = M This proves that the moment is independent of reference point, which is proof that a couple is a free vector. A force F applied to a body at a distance d from the center of mass has the same effect as the same force applied directly to the center of mass. The couple produces an acceleration of the rigid body at right angles to the plane of the couple. The force at the center of mass accelerates the body in the direction of the force without change in orientation, conversely, a couple and a force in the plane of the couple can be replaced by a single force, appropriately located

8.
D'Alembert's principle
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DAlemberts principle, also known as the Lagrange–dAlembert principle, is a statement of the fundamental classical laws of motion. It is named after its discoverer, the French physicist and mathematician Jean le Rond dAlembert and it is the dynamic analogue to the principle of virtual work for applied forces in a static system and in fact is more general than Hamiltons principle, avoiding restriction to holonomic systems. A holonomic constraint depends only on the coordinates and time and it does not depend on the velocities. The principle does not apply for irreversible displacements, such as sliding friction, DAlemberts contribution was to demonstrate that in the totality of a dynamic system the forces of constraint vanish. That is to say that the generalized forces Q j need not include constraint forces and it is equivalent to the somewhat more cumbersome Gausss principle of least constraint. The general statement of dAlemberts principle mentions the time derivatives of the momenta of the system. The momentum of the mass is the product of its mass and velocity, p i = m i v i. In many applications, the masses are constant and this reduces to p i ˙ = m i v ˙ i = m i a i. However, some applications involve changing masses and in those cases both terms m ˙ i v i and m i v ˙ i have to remain present, to date, nobody has shown that DAlemberts principle is equivalent to Newtons Second Law. This is true only for very special cases e. g. rigid body constraints. However, a solution to this problem does exist. Consider Newtons law for a system of particles, i, if arbitrary virtual displacements are assumed to be in directions that are orthogonal to the constraint forces, the constraint forces do no work. Such displacements are said to be consistent with the constraints and this leads to the formulation of dAlemberts principle, which states that the difference of applied forces and inertial forces for a dynamic system does no virtual work. There is also a principle for static systems called the principle of virtual work for applied forces. DAlembert showed that one can transform an accelerating rigid body into an equivalent static system by adding the so-called inertial force, the inertial force must act through the center of mass and the inertial torque can act anywhere. The system can then be analyzed exactly as a static system subjected to this force and moment. The advantage is that, in the equivalent static system one can take moments about any point and this often leads to simpler calculations because any force can be eliminated from the moment equations by choosing the appropriate point about which to apply the moment equation. Even in the course of Fundamentals of Dynamics and Kinematics of machines, in textbooks of engineering dynamics this is sometimes referred to as dAlemberts principle

9.
Energy
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In physics, energy is the property that must be transferred to an object in order to perform work on – or to heat – the object, and can be converted in form, but not created or destroyed. The SI unit of energy is the joule, which is the transferred to an object by the mechanical work of moving it a distance of 1 metre against a force of 1 newton. Mass and energy are closely related, for example, with a sensitive enough scale, one could measure an increase in mass after heating an object. Living organisms require available energy to stay alive, such as the humans get from food. Civilisation gets the energy it needs from energy resources such as fuels, nuclear fuel. The processes of Earths climate and ecosystem are driven by the radiant energy Earth receives from the sun, the total energy of a system can be subdivided and classified in various ways. It may also be convenient to distinguish gravitational energy, thermal energy, several types of energy, electric energy. Many of these overlap, for instance, thermal energy usually consists partly of kinetic. Some types of energy are a mix of both potential and kinetic energy. An example is energy which is the sum of kinetic. Whenever physical scientists discover that a phenomenon appears to violate the law of energy conservation. Heat and work are special cases in that they are not properties of systems, in general we cannot measure how much heat or work are present in an object, but rather only how much energy is transferred among objects in certain ways during the occurrence of a given process. Heat and work are measured as positive or negative depending on which side of the transfer we view them from, the distinctions between different kinds of energy is not always clear-cut. In contrast to the definition, energeia was a qualitative philosophical concept, broad enough to include ideas such as happiness. The modern analog of this property, kinetic energy, differs from vis viva only by a factor of two, in 1807, Thomas Young was possibly the first to use the term energy instead of vis viva, in its modern sense. Gustave-Gaspard Coriolis described kinetic energy in 1829 in its modern sense, the law of conservation of energy was also first postulated in the early 19th century, and applies to any isolated system. It was argued for years whether heat was a physical substance, dubbed the caloric, or merely a physical quantity. In 1845 James Prescott Joule discovered the link between mechanical work and the generation of heat and these developments led to the theory of conservation of energy, formalized largely by William Thomson as the field of thermodynamics

10.
Kinetic energy
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In physics, the kinetic energy of an object is the energy that it possesses due to its motion. It is defined as the work needed to accelerate a body of a mass from rest to its stated velocity. Having gained this energy during its acceleration, the body maintains this kinetic energy unless its speed changes, the same amount of work is done by the body in decelerating from its current speed to a state of rest. In classical mechanics, the energy of a non-rotating object of mass m traveling at a speed v is 12 m v 2. In relativistic mechanics, this is an approximation only when v is much less than the speed of light. The standard unit of energy is the joule. The adjective kinetic has its roots in the Greek word κίνησις kinesis, the dichotomy between kinetic energy and potential energy can be traced back to Aristotles concepts of actuality and potentiality. The principle in classical mechanics that E ∝ mv2 was first developed by Gottfried Leibniz and Johann Bernoulli, Willem s Gravesande of the Netherlands provided experimental evidence of this relationship. By dropping weights from different heights into a block of clay, Émilie du Châtelet recognized the implications of the experiment and published an explanation. The terms kinetic energy and work in their present scientific meanings date back to the mid-19th century, early understandings of these ideas can be attributed to Gaspard-Gustave Coriolis, who in 1829 published the paper titled Du Calcul de lEffet des Machines outlining the mathematics of kinetic energy. William Thomson, later Lord Kelvin, is given the credit for coining the term kinetic energy c, energy occurs in many forms, including chemical energy, thermal energy, electromagnetic radiation, gravitational energy, electric energy, elastic energy, nuclear energy, and rest energy. These can be categorized in two classes, potential energy and kinetic energy. Kinetic energy is the movement energy of an object, Kinetic energy can be transferred between objects and transformed into other kinds of energy. Kinetic energy may be best understood by examples that demonstrate how it is transformed to, for example, a cyclist uses chemical energy provided by food to accelerate a bicycle to a chosen speed. On a level surface, this speed can be maintained without further work, except to overcome air resistance, the chemical energy has been converted into kinetic energy, the energy of motion, but the process is not completely efficient and produces heat within the cyclist. The kinetic energy in the moving cyclist and the bicycle can be converted to other forms, for example, the cyclist could encounter a hill just high enough to coast up, so that the bicycle comes to a complete halt at the top. The kinetic energy has now largely converted to gravitational potential energy that can be released by freewheeling down the other side of the hill. Since the bicycle lost some of its energy to friction, it never regains all of its speed without additional pedaling, the energy is not destroyed, it has only been converted to another form by friction

11.
Potential energy
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In physics, potential energy is energy possessed by a body by virtue of its position relative to others, stresses within itself, electric charge, and other factors. The unit for energy in the International System of Units is the joule, the term potential energy was introduced by the 19th century Scottish engineer and physicist William Rankine, although it has links to Greek philosopher Aristotles concept of potentiality. Potential energy is associated with forces that act on a body in a way that the work done by these forces on the body depends only on the initial and final positions of the body in space. These forces, that are called potential forces, can be represented at every point in space by vectors expressed as gradients of a scalar function called potential. Potential energy is the energy of an object. It is the energy by virtue of a position relative to other objects. Potential energy is associated with restoring forces such as a spring or the force of gravity. The action of stretching the spring or lifting the mass is performed by a force that works against the force field of the potential. This work is stored in the field, which is said to be stored as potential energy. If the external force is removed the field acts on the body to perform the work as it moves the body back to the initial position. Suppose a ball which mass is m, and it is in h position in height, if the acceleration of free fall is g, the weight of the ball is mg. There are various types of energy, each associated with a particular type of force. Chemical potential energy, such as the energy stored in fossil fuels, is the work of the Coulomb force during rearrangement of mutual positions of electrons and nuclei in atoms and molecules. Thermal energy usually has two components, the energy of random motions of particles and the potential energy of their mutual positions. Forces derivable from a potential are also called conservative forces, the work done by a conservative force is W = − Δ U where Δ U is the change in the potential energy associated with the force. The negative sign provides the convention that work done against a force field increases potential energy, common notations for potential energy are U, V, also Ep. Potential energy is closely linked with forces, in this case, the force can be defined as the negative of the vector gradient of the potential field. If the work for a force is independent of the path, then the work done by the force is evaluated at the start

12.
Force
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In physics, a force is any interaction that, when unopposed, will change the motion of an object. In other words, a force can cause an object with mass to change its velocity, force can also be described intuitively as a push or a pull. A force has both magnitude and direction, making it a vector quantity and it is measured in the SI unit of newtons and represented by the symbol F. The original form of Newtons second law states that the net force acting upon an object is equal to the rate at which its momentum changes with time. In an extended body, each part usually applies forces on the adjacent parts, such internal mechanical stresses cause no accelation of that body as the forces balance one another. Pressure, the distribution of small forces applied over an area of a body, is a simple type of stress that if unbalanced can cause the body to accelerate. Stress usually causes deformation of materials, or flow in fluids. In part this was due to an understanding of the sometimes non-obvious force of friction. A fundamental error was the belief that a force is required to maintain motion, most of the previous misunderstandings about motion and force were eventually corrected by Galileo Galilei and Sir Isaac Newton. With his mathematical insight, Sir Isaac Newton formulated laws of motion that were not improved-on for nearly three hundred years, the Standard Model predicts that exchanged particles called gauge bosons are the fundamental means by which forces are emitted and absorbed. Only four main interactions are known, in order of decreasing strength, they are, strong, electromagnetic, weak, high-energy particle physics observations made during the 1970s and 1980s confirmed that the weak and electromagnetic forces are expressions of a more fundamental electroweak interaction. Since antiquity the concept of force has been recognized as integral to the functioning of each of the simple machines. The mechanical advantage given by a machine allowed for less force to be used in exchange for that force acting over a greater distance for the same amount of work. Analysis of the characteristics of forces ultimately culminated in the work of Archimedes who was famous for formulating a treatment of buoyant forces inherent in fluids. Aristotle provided a discussion of the concept of a force as an integral part of Aristotelian cosmology. In Aristotles view, the sphere contained four elements that come to rest at different natural places therein. Aristotle believed that objects on Earth, those composed mostly of the elements earth and water, to be in their natural place on the ground. He distinguished between the tendency of objects to find their natural place, which led to natural motion, and unnatural or forced motion

13.
Frame of reference
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In physics, a frame of reference consists of an abstract coordinate system and the set of physical reference points that uniquely fix the coordinate system and standardize measurements. In n dimensions, n+1 reference points are sufficient to define a reference frame. Using rectangular coordinates, a frame may be defined with a reference point at the origin. In Einsteinian relativity, reference frames are used to specify the relationship between an observer and the phenomenon or phenomena under observation. In this context, the phrase often becomes observational frame of reference, a relativistic reference frame includes the coordinate time, which does not correspond across different frames moving relatively to each other. The situation thus differs from Galilean relativity, where all possible coordinate times are essentially equivalent, the need to distinguish between the various meanings of frame of reference has led to a variety of terms. For example, sometimes the type of system is attached as a modifier. Sometimes the state of motion is emphasized, as in rotating frame of reference, sometimes the way it transforms to frames considered as related is emphasized as in Galilean frame of reference. Sometimes frames are distinguished by the scale of their observations, as in macroscopic and microscopic frames of reference, in this sense, an observational frame of reference allows study of the effect of motion upon an entire family of coordinate systems that could be attached to this frame. On the other hand, a system may be employed for many purposes where the state of motion is not the primary concern. For example, a system may be adopted to take advantage of the symmetry of a system. In a still broader perspective, the formulation of many problems in physics employs generalized coordinates, normal modes or eigenvectors and it seems useful to divorce the various aspects of a reference frame for the discussion below. A coordinate system is a concept, amounting to a choice of language used to describe observations. Consequently, an observer in a frame of reference can choose to employ any coordinate system to describe observations made from that frame of reference. A change in the choice of coordinate system does not change an observers state of motion. This viewpoint can be found elsewhere as well, which is not to dispute that some coordinate systems may be a better choice for some observations than are others. Choice of what to measure and with what observational apparatus is a separate from the observers state of motion. D. Norton, The discussion is taken beyond simple space-time coordinate systems by Brading, extension to coordinate systems using generalized coordinates underlies the Hamiltonian and Lagrangian formulations of quantum field theory, classical relativistic mechanics, and quantum gravity

14.
Inertial frame of reference
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In classical physics and special relativity, an inertial frame of reference is a frame of reference that describes time and space homogeneously, isotropically, and in a time-independent manner. The physics of a system in an inertial frame have no causes external to the system, all inertial frames are in a state of constant, rectilinear motion with respect to one another, an accelerometer moving with any of them would detect zero acceleration. Measurements in one frame can be converted to measurements in another by a simple transformation. In general relativity, in any region small enough for the curvature of spacetime and tidal forces to be negligible, systems in non-inertial frames in general relativity dont have external causes because of the principle of geodesic motion. Physical laws take the form in all inertial frames. For example, a ball dropped towards the ground does not go straight down because the Earth is rotating. Someone rotating with the Earth must account for the Coriolis effect—in this case thought of as a force—to predict the horizontal motion, another example of such a fictitious force associated with rotating reference frames is the centrifugal effect, or centrifugal force. The motion of a body can only be described relative to something else—other bodies, observers and these are called frames of reference. If the coordinates are chosen badly, the laws of motion may be more complex than necessary, for example, suppose a free body that has no external forces on it is at rest at some instant. In many coordinate systems, it would begin to move at the next instant, however, a frame of reference can always be chosen in which it remains stationary. Similarly, if space is not described uniformly or time independently, indeed, an intuitive summary of inertial frames can be given as, In an inertial reference frame, the laws of mechanics take their simplest form. In an inertial frame, Newtons first law, the law of inertia, is satisfied, Any free motion has a constant magnitude, the force F is the vector sum of all real forces on the particle, such as electromagnetic, gravitational, nuclear and so forth. The extra terms in the force F′ are the forces for this frame. The first extra term is the Coriolis force, the second the centrifugal force, also, fictitious forces do not drop off with distance. For example, the force that appears to emanate from the axis of rotation in a rotating frame increases with distance from the axis. All observers agree on the forces, F, only non-inertial observers need fictitious forces. The laws of physics in the frame are simpler because unnecessary forces are not present. In Newtons time the stars were invoked as a reference frame

15.
Impulse (physics)
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In classical mechanics, impulse is the integral of a force, F, over the time interval, t, for which it acts. Since force is a quantity, impulse is also a vector in the same direction. Impulse applied to an object produces an equivalent vector change in its linear momentum, the SI unit of impulse is the newton second, and the dimensionally equivalent unit of momentum is the kilogram meter per second. The corresponding English engineering units are the pound-second and the slug-foot per second, a resultant force causes acceleration and a change in the velocity of the body for as long as it acts. Conversely, a force applied for a long time produces the same change in momentum—the same impulse—as a larger force applied briefly. This is often called the impulse-momentum theorem, as a result, an impulse may also be regarded as the change in momentum of an object to which a resultant force is applied. Impulse has the units and dimensions as momentum. In the International System of Units, these are kg·m/s = N·s, in English engineering units, they are slug·ft/s = lbf·s. The term impulse is also used to refer to a force or impact. This type of impulse is often idealized so that the change in momentum produced by the force happens with no change in time and this sort of change is a step change, and is not physically possible. However, this is a model for computing the effects of ideal collisions. The application of Newtons second law for variable mass allows impulse, in the case of rockets, the impulse imparted can be normalized by unit of propellant expended, to create a performance parameter, specific impulse. This fact can be used to derive the Tsiolkovsky rocket equation, which relates the vehicles propulsive change in velocity to the specific impulse. Wave–particle duality defines the impulse of a wave collision, the preservation of momentum in the collision is then called phase matching. Applications include, Compton effect nonlinear optics Acousto-optic modulator Electron phonon scattering Serway, Raymond A. Jewett, John W. Physics for Scientists, Physics for Scientists and Engineers, Mechanics, Oscillations and Waves, Thermodynamics

16.
Inertia
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Inertia is the resistance of any physical object to any change in its state of motion, this includes changes to its speed, direction, or state of rest. It is the tendency of objects to keep moving in a line at constant velocity. The principle of inertia is one of the principles of classical physics that are used to describe the motion of objects. Inertia comes from the Latin word, iners, meaning idle, Inertia is one of the primary manifestations of mass, which is a quantitative property of physical systems. In common usage, the inertia may refer to an objects amount of resistance to change in velocity, or sometimes to its momentum. Thus, an object will continue moving at its current velocity until some force causes its speed or direction to change. On the surface of the Earth, inertia is often masked by the effects of friction and air resistance, both of which tend to decrease the speed of moving objects, and gravity. Aristotle explained the continued motion of projectiles, which are separated from their projector, by the action of the surrounding medium, Aristotle concluded that such violent motion in a void was impossible. Despite its general acceptance, Aristotles concept of motion was disputed on several occasions by notable philosophers over nearly two millennia, for example, Lucretius stated that the default state of matter was motion, not stasis. Philoponus proposed that motion was not maintained by the action of a surrounding medium, although this was not the modern concept of inertia, for there was still the need for a power to keep a body in motion, it proved a fundamental step in that direction. This view was opposed by Averroes and by many scholastic philosophers who supported Aristotle. However, this view did not go unchallenged in the Islamic world, in the 14th century, Jean Buridan rejected the notion that a motion-generating property, which he named impetus, dissipated spontaneously. Buridans position was that an object would be arrested by the resistance of the air. Buridan also maintained that impetus increased with speed, thus, his idea of impetus was similar in many ways to the modern concept of momentum. Buridan also believed that impetus could be not only linear, but also circular in nature, buridans thought was followed up by his pupil Albert of Saxony and the Oxford Calculators, who performed various experiments that further undermined the classical, Aristotelian view. Their work in turn was elaborated by Nicole Oresme who pioneered the practice of demonstrating laws of motion in the form of graphs, benedetti cites the motion of a rock in a sling as an example of the inherent linear motion of objects, forced into circular motion. The law of inertia states that it is the tendency of an object to resist a change in motion. According to Newton, an object will stay at rest or stay in motion unless acted on by a net force, whether it results from gravity, friction, contact

17.
Moment of inertia
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It depends on the bodys mass distribution and the axis chosen, with larger moments requiring more torque to change the bodys rotation. It is a property, the moment of inertia of a composite system is the sum of the moments of inertia of its component subsystems. One of its definitions is the moment of mass with respect to distance from an axis r, I = ∫ Q r 2 d m. For bodies constrained to rotate in a plane, it is sufficient to consider their moment of inertia about a perpendicular to the plane. When a body is rotating, or free to rotate, around an axis, the amount of torque needed to cause any given angular acceleration is proportional to the moment of inertia of the body. Moment of inertia may be expressed in units of kilogram metre squared in SI units, moment of inertia plays the role in rotational kinetics that mass plays in linear kinetics - both characterize the resistance of a body to changes in its motion. The moment of inertia depends on how mass is distributed around an axis of rotation, for a point-like mass, the moment of inertia about some axis is given by mr2, where r is the distance to the axis, and m is the mass. For an extended body, the moment of inertia is just the sum of all the pieces of mass multiplied by the square of their distances from the axis in question. For an extended body of a shape and uniform density. In 1673 Christiaan Huygens introduced this parameter in his study of the oscillation of a body hanging from a pivot, the term moment of inertia was introduced by Leonhard Euler in his book Theoria motus corporum solidorum seu rigidorum in 1765, and it is incorporated into Eulers second law. Comparison of this frequency to that of a simple pendulum consisting of a single point of mass provides a mathematical formulation for moment of inertia of an extended body. Moment of inertia appears in momentum, kinetic energy, and in Newtons laws of motion for a rigid body as a physical parameter that combines its shape. There is a difference in the way moment of inertia appears in planar. The moment of inertia of a flywheel is used in a machine to resist variations in applied torque to smooth its rotational output. Moment of inertia I is defined as the ratio of the angular momentum L of a system to its angular velocity ω around a principal axis, if the angular momentum of a system is constant, then as the moment of inertia gets smaller, the angular velocity must increase. This occurs when spinning figure skaters pull in their arms or divers curl their bodies into a tuck position during a dive. For a simple pendulum, this yields a formula for the moment of inertia I in terms of the mass m of the pendulum and its distance r from the pivot point as. Thus, moment of inertia depends on both the mass m of a body and its geometry, or shape, as defined by the distance r to the axis of rotation

18.
Mass
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In physics, mass is a property of a physical body. It is the measure of a resistance to acceleration when a net force is applied. It also determines the strength of its gravitational attraction to other bodies. The basic SI unit of mass is the kilogram, Mass is not the same as weight, even though mass is often determined by measuring the objects weight using a spring scale, rather than comparing it directly with known masses. An object on the Moon would weigh less than it does on Earth because of the lower gravity and this is because weight is a force, while mass is the property that determines the strength of this force. In Newtonian physics, mass can be generalized as the amount of matter in an object, however, at very high speeds, special relativity postulates that energy is an additional source of mass. Thus, any body having mass has an equivalent amount of energy. In addition, matter is a defined term in science. There are several distinct phenomena which can be used to measure mass, active gravitational mass measures the gravitational force exerted by an object. Passive gravitational mass measures the force exerted on an object in a known gravitational field. The mass of an object determines its acceleration in the presence of an applied force, according to Newtons second law of motion, if a body of fixed mass m is subjected to a single force F, its acceleration a is given by F/m. A bodys mass also determines the degree to which it generates or is affected by a gravitational field and this is sometimes referred to as gravitational mass. The standard International System of Units unit of mass is the kilogram, the kilogram is 1000 grams, first defined in 1795 as one cubic decimeter of water at the melting point of ice. Then in 1889, the kilogram was redefined as the mass of the prototype kilogram. As of January 2013, there are proposals for redefining the kilogram yet again. In this context, the mass has units of eV/c2, the electronvolt and its multiples, such as the MeV, are commonly used in particle physics. The atomic mass unit is 1/12 of the mass of a carbon-12 atom, the atomic mass unit is convenient for expressing the masses of atoms and molecules. Outside the SI system, other units of mass include, the slug is an Imperial unit of mass, the pound is a unit of both mass and force, used mainly in the United States

19.
Power (physics)
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In physics, power is the rate of doing work. It is the amount of energy consumed per unit time, having no direction, it is a scalar quantity. In the SI system, the unit of power is the joule per second, known as the watt in honour of James Watt, another common and traditional measure is horsepower. Being the rate of work, the equation for power can be written, because this integral depends on the trajectory of the point of application of the force and torque, this calculation of work is said to be path dependent. As a physical concept, power requires both a change in the universe and a specified time in which the change occurs. This is distinct from the concept of work, which is measured in terms of a net change in the state of the physical universe. The output power of a motor is the product of the torque that the motor generates. The power involved in moving a vehicle is the product of the force of the wheels. The dimension of power is divided by time. The SI unit of power is the watt, which is equal to one joule per second, other units of power include ergs per second, horsepower, metric horsepower, and foot-pounds per minute. One horsepower is equivalent to 33,000 foot-pounds per minute, or the required to lift 550 pounds by one foot in one second. Other units include dBm, a logarithmic measure with 1 milliwatt as reference, food calories per hour, Btu per hour. This shows how power is an amount of energy consumed per unit time. If ΔW is the amount of work performed during a period of time of duration Δt and it is the average amount of work done or energy converted per unit of time. The average power is simply called power when the context makes it clear. The instantaneous power is then the value of the average power as the time interval Δt approaches zero. P = lim Δ t →0 P a v g = lim Δ t →0 Δ W Δ t = d W d t. In the case of constant power P, the amount of work performed during a period of duration T is given by, W = P t

20.
Work (physics)
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In physics, a force is said to do work if, when acting, there is a displacement of the point of application in the direction of the force. For example, when a ball is held above the ground and then dropped, the SI unit of work is the joule. The SI unit of work is the joule, which is defined as the work expended by a force of one newton through a distance of one metre. The dimensionally equivalent newton-metre is sometimes used as the unit for work, but this can be confused with the unit newton-metre. Usage of N⋅m is discouraged by the SI authority, since it can lead to confusion as to whether the quantity expressed in newton metres is a torque measurement, or a measurement of energy. Non-SI units of work include the erg, the foot-pound, the foot-poundal, the hour, the litre-atmosphere. Due to work having the physical dimension as heat, occasionally measurement units typically reserved for heat or energy content, such as therm, BTU. The work done by a constant force of magnitude F on a point that moves a distance s in a line in the direction of the force is the product W = F s. For example, if a force of 10 newtons acts along a point that travels 2 meters and this is approximately the work done lifting a 1 kg weight from ground level to over a persons head against the force of gravity. Notice that the work is doubled either by lifting twice the weight the distance or by lifting the same weight twice the distance. Work is closely related to energy, the work-energy principle states that an increase in the kinetic energy of a rigid body is caused by an equal amount of positive work done on the body by the resultant force acting on that body. Conversely, a decrease in energy is caused by an equal amount of negative work done by the resultant force. From Newtons second law, it can be shown that work on a free, rigid body, is equal to the change in energy of the velocity and rotation of that body. The work of forces generated by a function is known as potential energy. These formulas demonstrate that work is the associated with the action of a force, so work subsequently possesses the physical dimensions. The work/energy principles discussed here are identical to Electric work/energy principles, constraint forces determine the movement of components in a system, constraining the object within a boundary. Constraint forces ensure the velocity in the direction of the constraint is zero and this only applies for a single particle system. For example, in an Atwood machine, the rope does work on each body, there are, however, cases where this is not true

21.
Momentum
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In classical mechanics, linear momentum, translational momentum, or simply momentum is the product of the mass and velocity of an object, quantified in kilogram-meters per second. It is dimensionally equivalent to impulse, the product of force and time, Newtons second law of motion states that the change in linear momentum of a body is equal to the net impulse acting on it. If the truck were lighter, or moving slowly, then it would have less momentum. Linear momentum is also a quantity, meaning that if a closed system is not affected by external forces. In classical mechanics, conservation of momentum is implied by Newtons laws. It also holds in special relativity and, with definitions, a linear momentum conservation law holds in electrodynamics, quantum mechanics, quantum field theory. It is ultimately an expression of one of the symmetries of space and time. Linear momentum depends on frame of reference, observers in different frames would find different values of linear momentum of a system. But each would observe that the value of linear momentum does not change with time, momentum has a direction as well as magnitude. Quantities that have both a magnitude and a direction are known as vector quantities, because momentum has a direction, it can be used to predict the resulting direction of objects after they collide, as well as their speeds. Below, the properties of momentum are described in one dimension. The vector equations are almost identical to the scalar equations, the momentum of a particle is traditionally represented by the letter p. It is the product of two quantities, the mass and velocity, p = m v, the units of momentum are the product of the units of mass and velocity. In SI units, if the mass is in kilograms and the velocity in meters per second then the momentum is in kilogram meters/second, in cgs units, if the mass is in grams and the velocity in centimeters per second, then the momentum is in gram centimeters/second. Being a vector, momentum has magnitude and direction, for example, a 1 kg model airplane, traveling due north at 1 m/s in straight and level flight, has a momentum of 1 kg m/s due north measured from the ground. The momentum of a system of particles is the sum of their momenta, if two particles have masses m1 and m2, and velocities v1 and v2, the total momentum is p = p 1 + p 2 = m 1 v 1 + m 2 v 2. If all the particles are moving, the center of mass will generally be moving as well, if the center of mass is moving at velocity vcm, the momentum is, p = m v cm. This is known as Eulers first law, if a force F is applied to a particle for a time interval Δt, the momentum of the particle changes by an amount Δ p = F Δ t

22.
Space
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Space is the boundless three-dimensional extent in which objects and events have relative position and direction. Physical space is conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually consider it, with time, to be part of a boundless four-dimensional continuum known as spacetime. The concept of space is considered to be of importance to an understanding of the physical universe. However, disagreement continues between philosophers over whether it is itself an entity, a relationship between entities, or part of a conceptual framework. Many of these classical philosophical questions were discussed in the Renaissance and then reformulated in the 17th century, in Isaac Newtons view, space was absolute—in the sense that it existed permanently and independently of whether there was any matter in the space. Other natural philosophers, notably Gottfried Leibniz, thought instead that space was in fact a collection of relations between objects, given by their distance and direction from one another. In the 18th century, the philosopher and theologian George Berkeley attempted to refute the visibility of spatial depth in his Essay Towards a New Theory of Vision. Kant referred to the experience of space in his Critique of Pure Reason as being a pure a priori form of intuition. In the 19th and 20th centuries mathematicians began to examine geometries that are non-Euclidean, in space is conceived as curved. According to Albert Einsteins theory of relativity, space around gravitational fields deviates from Euclidean space. Experimental tests of general relativity have confirmed that non-Euclidean geometries provide a model for the shape of space. In the seventeenth century, the philosophy of space and time emerged as an issue in epistemology. At its heart, Gottfried Leibniz, the German philosopher-mathematician, and Isaac Newton, unoccupied regions are those that could have objects in them, and thus spatial relations with other places. For Leibniz, then, space was an abstraction from the relations between individual entities or their possible locations and therefore could not be continuous but must be discrete. Space could be thought of in a way to the relations between family members. Although people in the family are related to one another, the relations do not exist independently of the people, but since there would be no observational way of telling these universes apart then, according to the identity of indiscernibles, there would be no real difference between them. According to the principle of sufficient reason, any theory of space that implied that there could be two possible universes must therefore be wrong. Newton took space to be more than relations between objects and based his position on observation and experimentation

23.
Speed
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In everyday use and in kinematics, the speed of an object is the magnitude of its velocity, it is thus a scalar quantity. Speed has the dimensions of distance divided by time, the SI unit of speed is the metre per second, but the most common unit of speed in everyday usage is the kilometre per hour or, in the US and the UK, miles per hour. For air and marine travel the knot is commonly used, the fastest possible speed at which energy or information can travel, according to special relativity, is the speed of light in a vacuum c =299792458 metres per second. Matter cannot quite reach the speed of light, as this would require an amount of energy. In relativity physics, the concept of rapidity replaces the classical idea of speed, italian physicist Galileo Galilei is usually credited with being the first to measure speed by considering the distance covered and the time it takes. Galileo defined speed as the distance covered per unit of time, in equation form, this is v = d t, where v is speed, d is distance, and t is time. A cyclist who covers 30 metres in a time of 2 seconds, objects in motion often have variations in speed. If s is the length of the path travelled until time t, in the special case where the velocity is constant, this can be simplified to v = s / t. The average speed over a time interval is the total distance travelled divided by the time duration. Speed at some instant, or assumed constant during a short period of time, is called instantaneous speed. By looking at a speedometer, one can read the speed of a car at any instant. A car travelling at 50 km/h generally goes for less than one hour at a constant speed, if the vehicle continued at that speed for half an hour, it would cover half that distance. If it continued for one minute, it would cover about 833 m. Different from instantaneous speed, average speed is defined as the distance covered divided by the time interval. For example, if a distance of 80 kilometres is driven in 1 hour, likewise, if 320 kilometres are travelled in 4 hours, the average speed is also 80 kilometres per hour. When a distance in kilometres is divided by a time in hours, average speed does not describe the speed variations that may have taken place during shorter time intervals, and so average speed is often quite different from a value of instantaneous speed. If the average speed and the time of travel are known, using this equation for an average speed of 80 kilometres per hour on a 4-hour trip, the distance covered is found to be 320 kilometres. Linear speed is the distance travelled per unit of time, while speed is the linear speed of something moving along a circular path

24.
Time
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Time is the indefinite continued progress of existence and events that occur in apparently irreversible succession from the past through the present to the future. Time is often referred to as the dimension, along with the three spatial dimensions. Time has long been an important subject of study in religion, philosophy, and science, nevertheless, diverse fields such as business, industry, sports, the sciences, and the performing arts all incorporate some notion of time into their respective measuring systems. Two contrasting viewpoints on time divide prominent philosophers, one view is that time is part of the fundamental structure of the universe—a dimension independent of events, in which events occur in sequence. Isaac Newton subscribed to this realist view, and hence it is referred to as Newtonian time. This second view, in the tradition of Gottfried Leibniz and Immanuel Kant, holds that time is neither an event nor a thing, Time in physics is unambiguously operationally defined as what a clock reads. Time is one of the seven fundamental physical quantities in both the International System of Units and International System of Quantities, Time is used to define other quantities—such as velocity—so defining time in terms of such quantities would result in circularity of definition. The operational definition leaves aside the question there is something called time, apart from the counting activity just mentioned, that flows. Investigations of a single continuum called spacetime bring questions about space into questions about time, questions that have their roots in the works of early students of natural philosophy. Furthermore, it may be there is a subjective component to time. Temporal measurement has occupied scientists and technologists, and was a motivation in navigation. Periodic events and periodic motion have long served as standards for units of time, examples include the apparent motion of the sun across the sky, the phases of the moon, the swing of a pendulum, and the beat of a heart. Currently, the unit of time, the second, is defined by measuring the electronic transition frequency of caesium atoms. Time is also of significant social importance, having economic value as well as value, due to an awareness of the limited time in each day. In day-to-day life, the clock is consulted for periods less than a day whereas the calendar is consulted for periods longer than a day, increasingly, personal electronic devices display both calendars and clocks simultaneously. The number that marks the occurrence of an event as to hour or date is obtained by counting from a fiducial epoch—a central reference point. Artifacts from the Paleolithic suggest that the moon was used to time as early as 6,000 years ago. Lunar calendars were among the first to appear, either 12 or 13 lunar months, without intercalation to add days or months to some years, seasons quickly drift in a calendar based solely on twelve lunar months

25.
Torque
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Torque, moment, or moment of force is rotational force. Just as a force is a push or a pull. Loosely speaking, torque is a measure of the force on an object such as a bolt or a flywheel. For example, pushing or pulling the handle of a wrench connected to a nut or bolt produces a torque that loosens or tightens the nut or bolt, the symbol for torque is typically τ, the lowercase Greek letter tau. When it is called moment of force, it is denoted by M. The SI unit for torque is the newton metre, for more on the units of torque, see Units. This article follows US physics terminology in its use of the word torque, in the UK and in US mechanical engineering, this is called moment of force, usually shortened to moment. In US physics and UK physics terminology these terms are interchangeable, unlike in US mechanical engineering, Torque is defined mathematically as the rate of change of angular momentum of an object. The definition of states that one or both of the angular velocity or the moment of inertia of an object are changing. Moment is the term used for the tendency of one or more applied forces to rotate an object about an axis. For example, a force applied to a shaft causing acceleration, such as a drill bit accelerating from rest. By contrast, a force on a beam produces a moment, but since the angular momentum of the beam is not changing. Similarly with any force couple on an object that has no change to its angular momentum and this article follows the US physics terminology by calling all moments by the term torque, whether or not they cause the angular momentum of an object to change. The concept of torque, also called moment or couple, originated with the studies of Archimedes on levers, the term torque was apparently introduced into English scientific literature by James Thomson, the brother of Lord Kelvin, in 1884. A force applied at an angle to a lever multiplied by its distance from the levers fulcrum is its torque. A force of three newtons applied two metres from the fulcrum, for example, exerts the same torque as a force of one newton applied six metres from the fulcrum. More generally, the torque on a particle can be defined as the product, τ = r × F, where r is the particles position vector relative to the fulcrum. Alternatively, τ = r F ⊥, where F⊥ is the amount of force directed perpendicularly to the position of the particle, any force directed parallel to the particles position vector does not produce a torque

26.
Velocity
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The velocity of an object is the rate of change of its position with respect to a frame of reference, and is a function of time. Velocity is equivalent to a specification of its speed and direction of motion, Velocity is an important concept in kinematics, the branch of classical mechanics that describes the motion of bodies. Velocity is a vector quantity, both magnitude and direction are needed to define it. The scalar absolute value of velocity is called speed, being a coherent derived unit whose quantity is measured in the SI system as metres per second or as the SI base unit of. For example,5 metres per second is a scalar, whereas 5 metres per second east is a vector, if there is a change in speed, direction or both, then the object has a changing velocity and is said to be undergoing an acceleration. To have a constant velocity, an object must have a constant speed in a constant direction, constant direction constrains the object to motion in a straight path thus, a constant velocity means motion in a straight line at a constant speed. For example, a car moving at a constant 20 kilometres per hour in a path has a constant speed. Hence, the car is considered to be undergoing an acceleration, Speed describes only how fast an object is moving, whereas velocity gives both how fast and in what direction the object is moving. If a car is said to travel at 60 km/h, its speed has been specified, however, if the car is said to move at 60 km/h to the north, its velocity has now been specified. The big difference can be noticed when we consider movement around a circle and this is because the average velocity is calculated by only considering the displacement between the starting and the end points while the average speed considers only the total distance traveled. Velocity is defined as the rate of change of position with respect to time, average velocity can be calculated as, v ¯ = Δ x Δ t. The average velocity is less than or equal to the average speed of an object. This can be seen by realizing that while distance is always strictly increasing, from this derivative equation, in the one-dimensional case it can be seen that the area under a velocity vs. time is the displacement, x. In calculus terms, the integral of the velocity v is the displacement function x. In the figure, this corresponds to the area under the curve labeled s. Since the derivative of the position with respect to time gives the change in position divided by the change in time, although velocity is defined as the rate of change of position, it is often common to start with an expression for an objects acceleration. As seen by the three green tangent lines in the figure, an objects instantaneous acceleration at a point in time is the slope of the tangent to the curve of a v graph at that point. In other words, acceleration is defined as the derivative of velocity with respect to time, from there, we can obtain an expression for velocity as the area under an a acceleration vs. time graph

27.
Virtual work
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Virtual work arises in the application of the principle of least action to the study of forces and movement of a mechanical system. The work of a force acting on a particle as it moves along a displacement will be different for different displacements, among all the possible displacements that a particle may follow, called virtual displacements, one will minimize the action. This displacement is therefore the displacement followed by the according to the principle of least action. The work of a force on a particle along a displacement is known as the virtual work. The principle of work had always been used in some form since antiquity in the study of statics. It was used by the Greeks, medieval Arabs and Latins, working with Leibnizian concepts, Johann Bernoulli systematized the virtual work principle and made explicit the concept of infinitesimal displacement. He was able to solve problems for both bodies as well as fluids. Bernoullis version of virtual work law appeared in his letter to Pierre Varignon in 1715 and this formulation of the principle is today known as the principle of virtual velocities and is commonly considered as the prototype of the contemporary virtual work principles. In 1743 DAlembert published his Traite de Dynamique where he applied the principle of work, based on the Bernoullis work. His idea was to convert a dynamical problem into static problem by introducing inertial force, consider a point particle that moves along a path which is described by a function r from point A, where r, to point B, where r. It is possible that the moves from A to B along a nearby path described by r + δr. The variation δr satisfies the requirement δr = δr =0, the components of the variation, δr1, δr2 and δr3, are called virtual displacements. This can be generalized to a mechanical system defined by the generalized coordinates qi. In which case, the variation of the qi is defined by the virtual displacements δqi. Virtual work is the work done by the applied forces. When considering forces applied to a body in equilibrium, the principle of least action requires the virtual work of these forces to be zero. Consider a particle P that moves from a point A to a point B along a trajectory r and it is important to notice that the value of the work W depends on the trajectory r. Suppose the force F is the same as F, the variation of the work δW associated with this nearby path, known as the virtual work, can be computed to be δ W = W ¯ − W = ∫ t 0 t 1 d t

28.
Analytical mechanics
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In theoretical physics and mathematical physics, analytical mechanics, or theoretical mechanics is a collection of closely related alternative formulations of classical mechanics. It was developed by scientists and mathematicians during the 18th century and onward. A scalar is a quantity, whereas a vector is represented by quantity, the equations of motion are derived from the scalar quantity by some underlying principle about the scalars variation. Analytical mechanics takes advantage of a systems constraints to solve problems, the constraints limit the degrees of freedom the system can have, and can be used to reduce the number of coordinates needed to solve for the motion. The formalism is well suited to arbitrary choices of coordinates, known in the context as generalized coordinates and it does not always work for non-conservative forces or dissipative forces like friction, in which case one may revert to Newtonian mechanics or use the Udwadia–Kalaba equation. Two dominant branches of mechanics are Lagrangian mechanics and Hamiltonian mechanics. There are other such as Hamilton–Jacobi theory, Routhian mechanics. All equations of motion for particles and fields, in any formalism, one result is Noethers theorem, a statement which connects conservation laws to their associated symmetries. Analytical mechanics does not introduce new physics and is not more general than Newtonian mechanics, rather it is a collection of equivalent formalisms which have broad application. In fact the principles and formalisms can be used in relativistic mechanics and general relativity. Analytical mechanics is used widely, from physics to applied mathematics. The methods of analytical mechanics apply to particles, each with a finite number of degrees of freedom. They can be modified to describe continuous fields or fluids, which have infinite degrees of freedom, the definitions and equations have a close analogy with those of mechanics. Generalized coordinates and constraints In Newtonian mechanics, one customarily uses all three Cartesian coordinates, or other 3D coordinate system, to refer to a position during its motion. In physical systems, however, some structure or other system usually constrains the motion from taking certain directions. In the Lagrangian and Hamiltonian formalisms, the constraints are incorporated into the motions geometry and these are known as generalized coordinates, denoted qi. Difference between curvillinear and generalized coordinates Generalized coordinates incorporate constraints on the system, there is one generalized coordinate qi for each degree of freedom, i. e. each way the system can change its configuration, as curvilinear lengths or angles of rotation. Generalized coordinates are not the same as curvilinear coordinates, DAlemberts principle The foundation which the subject is built on is DAlemberts principle

29.
Lagrangian mechanics
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Lagrangian mechanics is a reformulation of classical mechanics, introduced by the Italian-French mathematician and astronomer Joseph-Louis Lagrange in 1788. No new physics is introduced in Lagrangian mechanics compared to Newtonian mechanics, Newtons laws can include non-conservative forces like friction, however, they must include constraint forces explicitly and are best suited to Cartesian coordinates. Lagrangian mechanics is ideal for systems with conservative forces and for bypassing constraint forces in any coordinate system, dissipative and driven forces can be accounted for by splitting the external forces into a sum of potential and non-potential forces, leading to a set of modified Euler-Lagrange equations. Generalized coordinates can be chosen by convenience, to exploit symmetries in the system or the geometry of the constraints, Lagrangian mechanics also reveals conserved quantities and their symmetries in a direct way, as a special case of Noethers theorem. Lagrangian mechanics is important not just for its applications. It can also be applied to systems by analogy, for instance to coupled electric circuits with inductances and capacitances. Lagrangian mechanics is used to solve mechanical problems in physics. Lagrangian mechanics applies to the dynamics of particles, fields are described using a Lagrangian density, Lagranges equations are also used in optimisation problems of dynamic systems. In mechanics, Lagranges equations of the second kind are used more than those of the first kind. Suppose we have a bead sliding around on a wire, or a simple pendulum. This choice eliminates the need for the constraint force to enter into the resultant system of equations, there are fewer equations since one is not directly calculating the influence of the constraint on the particle at a given moment. For a wide variety of systems, if the size and shape of a massive object are negligible. For a system of N point particles with masses m1, m2, MN, each particle has a position vector, denoted r1, r2. Cartesian coordinates are often sufficient, so r1 =, r2 =, in three dimensional space, each position vector requires three coordinates to uniquely define the location of a point, so there are 3N coordinates to uniquely define the configuration of the system. These are all points in space to locate the particles. The velocity of particle is how fast the particle moves along its path of motion. In Newtonian mechanics, the equations of motion are given by Newtons laws, the second law net force equals mass times acceleration, Σ F = m d2r/dt2, applies to each particle. For an N particle system in 3d, there are 3N second order differential equations in the positions of the particles to solve for

30.
Routhian mechanics
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In analytical mechanics, a branch of theoretical physics, Routhian mechanics is a hybrid formulation of Lagrangian mechanics and Hamiltonian mechanics developed by Edward John Routh. Correspondingly, the Routhian is the function which replaces both the Lagrangian and Hamiltonian functions, the Routhian, like the Hamiltonian, can be obtained from a Legendre transform of the Lagrangian, and has a similar mathematical form to the Hamiltonian, but is not exactly the same. The difference between the Lagrangian, Hamiltonian, and Routhian functions are their variables, the Routhian differs from these functions in that some coordinates are chosen to have corresponding generalized velocities, the rest to have corresponding generalized momenta. This choice is arbitrary, and can be done to simplify the problem, in each case the Lagrangian and Hamiltonian functions are replaced by a single function, the Routhian. The full set thus has the advantages of both sets of equations, with the convenience of splitting one set of coordinates to the Hamilton equations, and the rest to the Lagrangian equations. The Lagrangian equations are powerful results, used frequently in theory, however, if cyclic coordinates occur there will still be equations to solve for all the coordinates, including the cyclic coordinates despite their absence in the Lagrangian. Overall fewer equations need to be solved compared to the Lagrangian approach, as with the rest of analytical mechanics, Routhian mechanics is completely equivalent to Newtonian mechanics, all other formulations of classical mechanics, and introduces no new physics. It offers a way to solve mechanical problems. The velocities dqi/dt are expressed as functions of their corresponding momenta by inverting their defining relation, in this context, pi is said to be the momentum canonically conjugate to qi. The Routhian is intermediate between L and H, some coordinates q1, q2, qn are chosen to have corresponding generalized momenta p1, p2. Pn, the rest of the coordinates ζ1, ζ2, ζs to have generalized velocities dζ1/dt, dζ2/dt. Dζs/dt, and time may appear explicitly, where again the generalized velocity dqi/dt is to be expressed as a function of generalized momentum pi via its defining relation. The choice of n coordinates are to have corresponding momenta. The above is used by Landau and Lifshitz, and Goldstein, some authors may define the Routhian to be the negative of the above definition. Below, the Routhian equations of motion are obtained in two ways, in the other useful derivatives are found that can be used elsewhere. Consider the case of a system with two degrees of freedom, q and ζ, with generalized velocities dq/dt and dζ/dt, now change variables, from the set to, simply switching the velocity dq/dt to the momentum p. This change of variables in the differentials is the Legendre transformation, the differential of the new function to replace L will be a sum of differentials in dq, dζ, dp, d, and dt. Notice the Routhian replaces the Hamiltonian and Lagrangian functions in all the equations of motion, the remaining equation states the partial time derivatives of L and R are negatives ∂ L ∂ t = − ∂ R ∂ t. n, and j =1,2

31.
Damping
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If a frictional force proportional to the velocity is also present, the harmonic oscillator is described as a damped oscillator. Depending on the coefficient, the system can, Oscillate with a frequency lower than in the non-damped case. Decay to the position, without oscillations. The boundary solution between an underdamped oscillator and an overdamped oscillator occurs at a value of the friction coefficient and is called critically damped. If an external time dependent force is present, the oscillator is described as a driven oscillator. Mechanical examples include pendulums, masses connected to springs, and acoustical systems, other analogous systems include electrical harmonic oscillators such as RLC circuits. The harmonic oscillator model is important in physics, because any mass subject to a force in stable equilibrium acts as a harmonic oscillator for small vibrations. Harmonic oscillators occur widely in nature and are exploited in many devices, such as clocks. They are the source of virtually all sinusoidal vibrations and waves, a simple harmonic oscillator is an oscillator that is neither driven nor damped. It consists of a m, which experiences a single force, F, which pulls the mass in the direction of the point x=0 and depends only on the masss position x. Balance of forces for the system is F = m a = m d 2 x d t 2 = m x ¨ = − k x. Solving this differential equation, we find that the motion is described by the function x = A cos ⁡, the motion is periodic, repeating itself in a sinusoidal fashion with constant amplitude, A. The position at a time t also depends on the phase, φ. The period and frequency are determined by the size of the mass m, the velocity and acceleration of a simple harmonic oscillator oscillate with the same frequency as the position but with shifted phases. The velocity is maximum for zero displacement, while the acceleration is in the direction as the displacement. The potential energy stored in a harmonic oscillator at position x is U =12 k x 2. In real oscillators, friction, or damping, slows the motion of the system, due to frictional force, the velocity decreases in proportion to the acting frictional force. While simple harmonic motion oscillates with only the force acting on the system

32.
Damping ratio
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In engineering, the damping ratio is a dimensionless measure describing how oscillations in a system decay after a disturbance. Many systems exhibit oscillatory behavior when they are disturbed from their position of static equilibrium, a mass suspended from a spring, for example, might, if pulled and released, bounce up and down. On each bounce, the system is trying to return to its equilibrium position, sometimes losses damp the system and can cause the oscillations to gradually decay in amplitude towards zero or attenuate. The damping ratio is a measure of describing how rapidly the oscillations decay from one bounce to the next, where the spring–mass system is completely lossless, the mass would oscillate indefinitely, with each bounce of equal height to the last. This hypothetical case is called undamped, If the system contained high losses, for example if the spring–mass experiment were conducted in a viscous fluid, the mass could slowly return to its rest position without ever overshooting. Commonly, the mass tends to overshoot its starting position, and then return, with each overshoot, some energy in the system is dissipated, and the oscillations die towards zero. Between the overdamped and underdamped cases, there exists a level of damping at which the system will just fail to overshoot. This case is called critical damping, the key difference between critical damping and overdamping is that, in critical damping, the system returns to equilibrium in the minimum amount of time. The damping ratio is a parameter, usually denoted by ζ and it is particularly important in the study of control theory. It is also important in the harmonic oscillator, the damping ratio provides a mathematical means of expressing the level of damping in a system relative to critical damping. This equation can be solved with the approach, X = C e s t, where C and s are both complex constants. That approach assumes a solution that is oscillatory and/or decaying exponentially, using it in the ODE gives a condition on the frequency of the damped oscillations, s = − ω n. Undamped, Is the case where ζ →0 corresponds to the simple harmonic oscillator. Underdamped, If s is a number, then the solution is a decaying exponential combined with an oscillatory portion that looks like exp ⁡. This case occurs for ζ <1, and is referred to as underdamped, overdamped, If s is a real number, then the solution is simply a decaying exponential with no oscillation. This case occurs for ζ >1, and is referred to as overdamped, critically damped, The case where ζ =1 is the border between the overdamped and underdamped cases, and is referred to as critically damped. This turns out to be an outcome in many cases where engineering design of a damped oscillator is required. The factors Q, damping ratio ζ, and exponential decay rate α are related such that ζ =12 Q = α ω0, a lower damping ratio implies a lower decay rate, and so very underdamped systems oscillate for long times

33.
Displacement (vector)
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A displacement is a vector that is the shortest distance from the initial to the final position of a point P. It quantifies both the distance and direction of an imaginary motion along a line from the initial position to the final position of the point. The velocity then is distinct from the speed which is the time rate of change of the distance traveled along a specific path. The velocity may be defined as the time rate of change of the position vector. For motion over an interval of time, the displacement divided by the length of the time interval defines the average velocity. In dealing with the motion of a body, the term displacement may also include the rotations of the body. In this case, the displacement of a particle of the body is called linear displacement, for a position vector s that is a function of time t, the derivatives can be computed with respect to t. These derivatives have common utility in the study of kinematics, control theory, vibration sensing and other sciences, by extension, the higher order derivatives can be computed in a similar fashion. Study of these higher order derivatives can improve approximations of the displacement function. Such higher-order terms are required in order to represent the displacement function as a sum of an infinite series, enabling several analytical techniques in engineering. The fourth order derivative is called jounce

34.
Equations of motion
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In mathematical physics, equations of motion are equations that describe the behaviour of a physical system in terms of its motion as a function of time. The most general choice are generalized coordinates which can be any convenient variables characteristic of the physical system, the functions are defined in a Euclidean space in classical mechanics, but are replaced by curved spaces in relativity. If the dynamics of a system is known, the equations are the solutions to the equations describing the motion of the dynamics. There are two descriptions of motion, dynamics and kinematics. Dynamics is general, since momenta, forces and energy of the particles are taken into account, in this instance, sometimes the term refers to the differential equations that the system satisfies, and sometimes to the solutions to those equations. However, kinematics is simpler as it concerns only variables derived from the positions of objects, equations of motion can therefore be grouped under these main classifiers of motion. In all cases, the types of motion are translations, rotations, oscillations. A differential equation of motion, usually identified as some physical law, solving the differential equation will lead to a general solution with arbitrary constants, the arbitrariness corresponding to a family of solutions. A particular solution can be obtained by setting the initial values, to state this formally, in general an equation of motion M is a function of the position r of the object, its velocity, and its acceleration, and time t. Euclidean vectors in 3D are denoted throughout in bold and this is equivalent to saying an equation of motion in r is a second order ordinary differential equation in r, M =0, where t is time, and each overdot denotes one time derivative. The initial conditions are given by the constant values at t =0, r, r ˙, the solution r to the equation of motion, with specified initial values, describes the system for all times t after t =0. Sometimes, the equation will be linear and is likely to be exactly solvable. In general, the equation will be non-linear, and cannot be solved exactly so a variety of approximations must be used, the solutions to nonlinear equations may show chaotic behavior depending on how sensitive the system is to the initial conditions. Despite the great strides made in the development of geometry made by Ancient Greeks and surveys in Rome, the exposure of Europe to Arabic numerals and their ease in computations encouraged first the scholars to learn them and then the merchants and invigorated the spread of knowledge throughout Europe. These studies led to a new body of knowledge that is now known as physics, thomas Bradwardine, one of those scholars, extended Aristotelian quantities such as distance and velocity, and assigned intensity and extension to them. Bradwardine suggested a law involving force, resistance, distance, velocity. Nicholas Oresme further extended Bradwardines arguments, for writers on kinematics before Galileo, since small time intervals could not be measured, the affinity between time and motion was obscure. They used time as a function of distance, and in free fall, de Sotos comments are shockingly correct regarding the definitions of acceleration and the observation that during the violent motion of ascent acceleration would be negative

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Fictitious force
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The force F does not arise from any physical interaction between two objects, but rather from the acceleration a of the non-inertial reference frame itself. As stated by Iro, Such an additional force due to relative motion of two reference frames is called a pseudo-force. Assuming Newtons second law in the form F = ma, fictitious forces are proportional to the mass m. A fictitious force on an object arises when the frame of reference used to describe the motion is accelerating compared to a non-accelerating frame. As a frame can accelerate in any way, so can fictitious forces be as arbitrary. Gravitational force would also be a force based upon a field model in which particles distort spacetime due to their mass. The role of forces in Newtonian mechanics is described by Tonnelat. To solve classical mechanics problems exactly in an Earth-bound reference frame, the Euler force is typically ignored because the variations in the angular velocity of the rotating Earth surface are usually insignificant. Both of the fictitious forces are weak compared to most typical forces in everyday life. For example, Léon Foucault was able to show that the Coriolis force results from the Earths rotation using the Foucault pendulum. If the Earth were to rotate a thousand times faster, people could easily get the impression that such forces are pulling on them. Other accelerations also give rise to forces, as described mathematically below. An example of the detection of a non-inertial, rotating reference frame is the precession of a Foucault pendulum, in the non-inertial frame of the Earth, the fictitious Coriolis force is necessary to explain observations. In an inertial frame outside the Earth, no such force is necessary. Figure 1 shows an accelerating car, when a car accelerates, a passenger feels like theyre being pushed back into the seat. In an inertial frame of reference attached to the road, there is no physical force moving the rider backward, however, in the riders non-inertial reference frame attached to the accelerating car, there is a backward fictitious force. We mention two possible reasons for the force to clarify its existence, Figure 1, to an observer at rest on an inertial reference frame, the car will seem to accelerate. In order for the passenger to stay inside the car, a force must be exerted on the passenger

In physics, potential energy is the energy possessed by an object because of its position relative to other objects, …

In the case of a bow and arrow, when the archer does work on the bow, drawing the string back, some of the chemical energy of the archer's body is transformed into elastic potential energy in the bent limbs of the bow. When the string is released, the force between the string and the arrow does work on the arrow. The potential energy in the bow limbs is transformed into the kinetic energy of the arrow as it takes flight.

A trebuchet uses the gravitational potential energy of the counterweight to throw projectiles over two hundred metres

In physics, a force is any interaction that, when unopposed, will change the motion of an object. A force can cause an …

Aristotle famously described a force as anything that causes an object to undergo "unnatural motion"

Galileo Galilei was the first to point out the inherent contradictions contained in Aristotle's description of forces.

Images of a freely falling basketball taken with a stroboscope at 20 flashes per second. The distance units on the right are multiples of about 12 millimetres. The basketball starts at rest. At the time of the first flash (distance zero) it is released, after which the number of units fallen is equal to the square of the number of flashes.

Pendulums used in Mendenhall gravimeter apparatus, from 1897 scientific journal. The portable gravimeter developed in 1890 by Thomas C. Mendenhall provided the most accurate relative measurements of the local gravitational field of the Earth.

In physics, the Coriolis force is an inertial force that acts on objects that are in motion relative to a rotating …

Image from Cursus seu Mundus Mathematicus (1674) of C.F.M. Dechales, showing how a cannonball should deflect to the right of its target on a rotating Earth, because the rightward motion of the ball is faster than that of the tower.

Image from Cursus seu Mundus Mathematicus (1674) of C.F.M. Dechales, showing how a ball should fall from a tower on a rotating Earth. The ball is released from F. The top of the tower moves faster than its base, so while the ball falls, the base of the tower moves to I, but the ball, which has the eastward speed of the tower's top, outruns the tower's base and lands further to the east at L.

A carousel is rotating counter-clockwise. Left panel: a ball is tossed by a thrower at 12:00 o'clock and travels in a straight line to the center of the carousel. While it travels, the thrower circles in a counter-clockwise direction. Right panel: The ball's motion as seen by the thrower, who now remains at 12:00 o'clock, because there is no rotation from their viewpoint.

This low-pressure system over Iceland spins counterclockwise due to balance between the Coriolis force and the pressure gradient force.

Bead constrained to move on a frictionless wire. The wire exerts a reaction force C on the bead to keep it on the wire. The non-constraint force N in this case is gravity. Notice the initial position of the wire can lead to different motions.

In physics, angular momentum (rarely, moment of momentum or rotational momentum) is the rotational equivalent of linear …

This gyroscope remains upright while spinning due to the conservation of its angular momentum.

Velocity of the particle m with respect to the origin O can be resolved into components parallel to (v//) and perpendicular to (v⊥) the radius vector r. The angular momentum of m is proportional to the perpendicular component v⊥ of the velocity, or equivalently, to the perpendicular distance r⊥ from the origin.

Acceleration, in physics, is the rate of change of velocity of an object with respect to time. An object's acceleration …

Components of acceleration for a curved motion. The tangential component at is due to the change in speed of traversal, and points along the curve in the direction of the velocity vector (or in the opposite direction). The normal component (also called centripetal component for circular motion) ac is due to the change in direction of the velocity vector and is normal to the trajectory, pointing toward the center of curvature of the path.

Acceleration is the rate of change of velocity. At any point on a trajectory, the magnitude of the acceleration is given by the rate of change of velocity in both magnitude and direction at that point. The true acceleration at time t is found in the limit as time interval Δt → 0 of Δv/Δt

When the mass is not moving, the object experiences static friction. The friction increases as the applied force increases until the block moves. After the block moves, it experiences kinetic friction, which is less than the maximum static friction.

Free-body diagram for a block on a ramp. Arrows are vectors indicating directions and magnitudes of forces. N is the normal force, mg is the force of gravity, and Ff is the force of friction.

In physics, power is the rate of doing work, the amount of energy transferred per unit time. Having no direction, it is …

Ansel Adams photograph of electrical wires of the Boulder Dam Power Units, 1941–1942

In a train of identical pulses, the instantaneous power is a periodic function of time. The ratio of the pulse duration to the period is equal to the ratio of the average power to the peak power. It is also called the duty cycle (see text for definitions).

In Newtonian mechanics, linear momentum, translational momentum, or simply momentum (pl. momenta) is the product of the …

A pool break-off shot

Newton's apple in Einstein's elevator. In person A's frame of reference, the apple has non-zero velocity and momentum. In the elevator's and person B's frames of reference, it has zero velocity and momentum.

An illustration of Newton's third law in which two skaters push against each other. The first skater on the left exerts a normal force N12 on the second skater directed towards the right, and the second skater exerts a normal force N21 on the first skater directed towards the left. The magnitudes of both forces are equal, but they have opposite directions, as dictated by Newton's third law.

Example of a velocity vs. time graph, and the relationship between velocity v on the y-axis, acceleration a (the three green tangent lines represent the values for acceleration at different points along the curve) and displacement s (the yellow area under the curve.)

A fictitious force (also called a pseudo force, d'Alembert force, or inertial force) is an apparent force that acts on …

Figure 3: An orbiting but fixed orientation coordinate system B, shown at three different times. The unit vectors uj, j = 1, 2, 3 do not rotate, but maintain a fixed orientation, while the origin of the coordinate system B moves at constant angular rate ω about the fixed axis Ω. Axis Ω passes through the origin of inertial frame A, so the origin of frame B is a fixed distance R from the origin of inertial frame A.

Figure 4: An orbiting coordinate system B similar to Figure 3, but in which unit vectors uj, j = 1, 2, 3 rotate to face the rotational axis, while the origin of the coordinate system B moves at constant angular rate ω about the fixed axis Ω.

Figure 5: Crossing a rotating carousel walking at constant speed from the center of the carousel to its edge, a spiral is traced out in the inertial frame, while a simple straight radial path is seen in the frame of the carousel.

In physics, circular motion is a movement of an object along the circumference of a circle or rotation along a circular …

Figure 3: (Left) Ball in circular motion – rope provides centripetal force to keep ball in circle (Right) Rope is cut and ball continues in straight line with velocity at the time of cutting the rope, in accord with Newton's law of inertia, because centripetal force is no longer there.

Image: Velocity acceleration

Image: Vectors in polar coordinates

Figure 1: Velocity v and acceleration a in uniform circular motion at angular rate ω; the speed is constant, but the velocity is always tangent to the orbit; the acceleration has constant magnitude, but always points toward the center of rotation.

In physics, a frame of reference (or reference frame) consists of an abstract coordinate system and the set of physical …

Figure 1: Two cars moving at different but constant velocities observed from stationary inertial frame S attached to the road and moving inertial frame S′ attached to the first car.

Figure 2: Simple-minded frame-of-reference example

An observer O, situated at the origin of a local set of coordinates – a frame of reference F. The observer in this frame uses the coordinates (x, y, z, t) to describe a spacetime event, shown as a star.

Three frames of reference in special relativity. The black frame is at rest. The primed frame moves at 40% of light speed, and the double primed frame at 80%. Note the scissors-like change as speed increases.

Torque, moment, or moment of force is rotational force. Just as a linear force is a push or a pull, a torque can be …

Moment arm diagram

The torque caused by the two opposing forces Fg and −Fg causes a change in the angular momentum L in the direction of that torque. This causes the top to precess.

Torque curve of a motorcycle ("BMW K 1200 R 2005"). The horizontal axis is the speed (in rpm) that the crankshaft is turning, and the vertical axis is the torque (in newton metres) that the engine is capable of providing at that speed.